We Can’t Be Both Paid Protesters And An Angry Mob. GOP, Your panic Is Showing: Thursday’s Good News

So I have noticed that Trump, McConnell and their awful ilk have taken to calling us angry mobs and to insinuating that we are paid protesters.

We can’t be both angry mobs AND paid protesters.

Paid protesters are there for the $$, not for the emotion. Their faked passion means nothing. No wonder they want their side to believe that we are paid protesters. That means that we aren’t really the majority (we are) that we aren’t really fired up (we are) and that we aren’t really coming for them in November (we are).

Angry mobs have the passion. They want their followers to believe that we are angry mobs because then it means that our concerns are not well reasoned and valid (they are) and we shouldn’t be trusted to govern (we should).

It doesn’t seem to occur to them that they are making arguments that are factually inconsistent. And, although I know it won’t matter to their fervent followers, I LOVE that their arguments against us are so weak, because it betrays that their entire enterprise is weak, built on a house of lies, and fueled by their intense fear.

They fear us. Not because we are a mob or because we are paid. They fear us because we are the majority. They fear us because we are organized. They fear us because we are motivated. They fear us because we have truth and decency and true American values on our side. We terrify them.

And we should, because despite their bluster that getting Kavanaugh on the bench would motivate their base, it hasn’t.

Modern conservatism, which has proven to us repeatedly that it can’t manage the economy effectively, prosecute a war successfully, or win the White House honestly any more, is very adept at one thing: Whining.

News reports didn’t often provide this context I’m about to give you, but this was astonishing. Historically, most people don’t pay close attention to Supreme Court nominations, and they just assume that if the president chooses someone, there must be a good reason. Strong pluralities continued to back Clarence Thomas in 1991 even after Anita Hill testified. It’s extremely unusual, and possibly unprecedented, for most Americans to oppose a Supreme Court nominee. But it’s the case here.

It is also a fact that more Americans believed Christine Blasey Ford than believed Kavanaugh. That same NPR-PBS poll had it at 45 percent believing Ford, and 32 percent Kavanaugh.

Republicans, not Democrats, are in the minority.

Angry? You bet we are. But crazy? Out of touch? Absolutely not. We who oppose Kavanaugh are the majority. We are the decent people of the heartland.

The ultimate goal of the conservative narrative is to create an atmosphere that depresses Democratic turnout. They’re doing this because they’re terrified that what they’ve done is going to send turnout among liberals and women in particular through the roof. On that one point alone, let’s go out on November 6 and prove them right.

The diversity of those who identify as survivors will make them far more difficult to other-ize as a “mob” because they will exist among a wide swath people of differing races, ethnicities, religions, socioeconomic groups, genders, and even political parties. This phenomenon is partly how the LGBTQ movement—despite only accounting for around 3 to 6 percent of the nation—managed to derive a great deal of sympathy and thus political power. As LGBTQ folks “came out” in kitchen table conversations across the country, millions of unsuspecting Americans learned for the first time that they knew someone who was lesbian, gay, or transgender. That revelation made it difficult for Republicans to vilify LGBTQ Americans over the long haul, even if it energized their base for a handful of years.

Those same types of conversations are now taking place among sexual assault survivors and their families and friends, with many more survivors still considering how and when they might share their experience with loved ones.

In the meantime, every time Trump belittles Dr. Christine Blasey Ford and derides the “angry mob” of women who were inspired by her courageous testimony, he is inflaming a movement of people who are just now discovering the power of both their numbers and their shared experience

We are coming for you GOP. Which brings me to my first section of good news:

Great Election News

If we drill into our House forecast, we expect the national House popular vote to favor Democrats by 7.8 percentage points,

what happens at D+8? Republicans’ structural advantage in how districts are drawn (gerrymandering, as well as the phenomenon of self-sorting, whereby Democrats tend to cluster in cities, which are already heavily Democratic) begins to erode. That advantage normally allows Republicans to keep control of the House while still losing the popular vote by a modest margin. But if Republicans lose the popular vote by too much, their firewall might break all at once, and Democratic gains could multiply.

Did you get that? if we are up by 8 or more than we move into firmer territory. Where are we in the latest polls? 10 points:

at this stage of the inquiry, even a replacement dead set on shutting it down would find such a maneuver nearly impossible to accomplish — and with each day that goes by, it becomes even harder.

To begin with, there is no such thing as a single “Russia investigation.” The F.B.I. pursues cases against individuals and organizations, not topics — this allows each case to have the flexibility to go in the direction the evidence leads, regardless of what happens with other, related cases.

Further, existing cases spawn new cases.

Finally, many of the most critical parts of the Russia investigation have already entered the judicial system.

Pinedo, a California resident, cooperated with Mueller’s probe, including testifying for the special counsel’s grand jury, after he was approached by the FBI. Before his sentencing Pinedo’s lawyer asked the judge for leniency, emphasizing Pinedo’s cooperation with Mueller and noting that he was living in fear while helping the government’s Russia probe.

Pinedo acted as a middleman of sorts, selling bank account numbers connected to real people that he purchased on the black market (though not stealing the bank account numbers directly himself) to anonymous customers. Among those customers were some of the Russian internet trolls whom Mueller has alleged sought to influence the 2016 election, though Pinedo was not aware that he was facilitating the alleged election meddling scheme.

Pinedo’s plea deal with Mueller was first filed under seal, and was not publicly revealed until Mueller unveiled his charges against the Russian individuals and entities last February. Wednesday’s hearing marked the first time Pinedo appeared in the D.C. federal courthouse with the media watching. The lanky 28-year-old wore a black suit with a gray patterned tie, his black hair slicked back. His father, also named Richard Pinedo, was present in the courtroom for the sentencing, and had written a letter to the judge vouching for his son.

In a motion to dismiss a new lawsuit accusing President Donald Trump’s campaign team of illegally conspiring with Russian agents to disseminate stolen emails during the election, Trump campaign lawyers have tried out a new defense: free speech.

The lawsuit, filed last month by two donors and one former employee of the Democratic National Committee, alleges that the Trump campaign, along with former Trump adviser Roger Stone, worked with Russia and WikiLeaks to publish hacked DNC emails, thereby violating their privacy.

But the Trump campaign—represented by Jeffrey Baltruzak, Michael A. Carvin, Nikki L. McArthur, and Vivek Suri, all of the law firm Jones Day—responded in a brief filed Tuesday that the campaign can’t be held legally responsible for WikiLeaks’s publication of the DNC emails.

Furthermore, the Trump lawyers argued, the First Amendment protects the campaign’s “right to disclose information—even stolen information—so long as (1) the speaker did not participate in the theft and (2) the information deals with matters of public concern.”

Why is this good news? Because it means they have gotten to the level of desperation where they are trying out the “collusion isn’t a crime” defense. To me, this sounds like they know what is coming and they know it is bad enough that a Hail Mary like this is all they may have.

And it ain’t going to work.

Other Good News

something of enormous global significance is happening almost without notice. For the first time since agriculture-based civilization began 10,000 years ago, the majority of humankind is no longer poor or vulnerable to falling into poverty. By our calculations, as of this month, just over 50 percent of the world’s population, or some 3.8 billion people, live in households with enough discretionary expenditure to be considered “middle class” or “rich.” About the same number of people are living in households that are poor or vulnerable to poverty. So September 2018 marks a global tipping point. After this, for the first time ever, the poor and vulnerable will no longer be a majority in the world. Barring some unfortunate global economic setback, this marks the start of a new era of a middle-class majority.

That is it for today. Sending love to all of those dealing with the hurricane today.

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The whole Republican Party should be dissolved. They do not represent the American people. A brand new party should be put in its place. Trump, McConnell, Grassley, Hatch and Ryan are two faced and disgusting human beings.

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4 months ago

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